Over the last few decades the use of glass cockpits for aircraft, in which traditional analogue instrument displays have been replaced by on-screen electronic instrument displays, has become increasingly common even in light aircraft. Indeed, since the late 1980's certified electronic flight instrument systems (EFIS's) including such electronic instrument displays have become standard equipment on most Boeing® and Airbus® airliners.
Whilst recent advances in computing power, and reductions in the cost of display screens and navigational sensors (such as global positioning satellite (GPS) systems, attitude and heading reference systems etc.), have brought EFIS's to a wider market, they generally still use manufacturer-specific proprietary technology to provide the complex high-resolution graphics needed to provide the specific essential display components required for use in aircraft, such as the attitude director indicator (ADI), horizontal situation indicator (HSI), etc.
Consequently, as increased functionality, complexity and resolution is added to such EFIS displays, more processing power is demanded from the proprietary technology processors merely in order to generate the scene provided on the display to the pilots. This not only negates some of the benefits of using newer generation processors operating with higher clock rates, for example, but also increases coding complexity and coding length when programming the display output. This therefore increases the developer time needed and also increases the possibility of errors being introduced into the code when providing newer generation certified or uncertified EFIS's.